If the ancient Egyptian Karnak Curse in our previous post didn't do it for you, then how about a curse from the creepy old Carnoc Castle grotto instead? This story originally appeared here at THOIA in a black and white reprint version way back in 2017 (HERE), --but everyone hated the scan quality so I swore on the blood of thy ancestors that someday I would re-feature the proper, original story from the October 1951 debut issue of This Magazine is Haunted #1. George Evans art definitely deserves to be viewed in this manner, any 'ol way. Annnnd because the story is a whoppin' 13 pages long, I thought, hey, why not make this post even longer with some additional TMIH filler quickies, like even more fun Facts About Witches and Witchcraft (from TMIH #20), as well as a two-page Ditko horror adventure, via TMIH #17. This blog is pretty damned haunted too, you know?
7 comments:
Did know that Jakarta was on the Amazon? Now you do!
The main story was a good one. I was expecting the undead man to be a vampire, but the story did something quite a lot cleverer. And, as I said before, I love stories where the villain wins
Thanks for the really hard work of finding, scanning and posting the original of this tale. For the record, I didn't hate the version posted back in 2017, I just viewed the black and white version the same way I viewed knock off VHS bootleg copies of horror movies, not technically perfect but still enjoyable, warts and all.
The story itself is great, not just the art but the story itself. The plot of eternal life and youth without the need of becoming a vampire was a unique idea.
Its a shame no one thought to turn this into a movie or an episode of a horror anthology.
"Facts About Witches and Witchcraft" a great one pager that gets the job done. This could have been used as the basis for a longer tale of how a wronged woman joined their local coven.
Excluding the cape, Ol' scratch is going commando. I wonder if Brian Barnes will notice that.
In Triple Header, the husband Mike reminds me of Orson Wells for some reason.
A triple header, one day before Baseball season traditionally begins. Thanks for the home run posts.
Darn, The idea pops into my head after I hit the publish button-
First it was "The Devil Wears Prada", the remake should be "The Devil Goes Commando.,"
It will have to be an art house film to avoid an NC 17 or X rating.
Uh oh, I looked back on those comments from 2017. I was one of the ones ripping on how bad that black and white version was. (and my opinion still stands there) The story itself still remains dark and gloomy although I still can't help but chuckle at that goofy looking horse on the last panel of page 8 before the poor thing dies. This story is interesting because we don't really get the full backstory of the duke's quest for youthful immortality until Delena is revealed to be the witch who helped him achieve it. There are some hints though about Delena in the beginning though, such as her insistance of being betrothed to a young nobleman, already knowing where the castle is and not wanting to be late for the unearthing of the coffin. I love that panel of the devil playing music for the toads. It's so awesome. As for the third tale, looks like nobody got away with murder, except for those natives of course.
Maybe I'm awful, but I never want a "Norma" type character to get it.
Flipping back and forth between versions, it's interesting the way they mutilated page two of this story for the black and white reprint. Glowworm mentioned this in the comments under the older post, but I didn't understand at the time. To remove the first page from the story, but still keep the intro and title, they slashed all the page two panels by thirds. While reading, I'd assumed they were just trying to keep the page count down. But maybe it was just a side effect of their use of page one elements for the cover--where it was very well colored, actually. So even though the story suffered in the Mystic reprint, the splash panel was treated like a king!
But this story still looks way better in this original version. Color really brings out art elements, like that super weird landscape in the second panel of page three, the spotlit grave diggers at the top of page six, and the eerie tree shadows in the middle of seven. Story-wise, I wish we got a little more horror. I love the bits where the reanimated Duke of Allister walks the Earth accidentally disintegrating the soft tissues of the living things around him. That's a pretty heady visual I'd love to see more of. I find the dying horse to be terrifying, bringing back nightmares of accidentally watching Georges Franju’s Blood of the Beasts (Le sang des bêtes, 1949) one night long ago. Shudder.
And I gotta hand it to Ditko, he turned a punchy and grotesque two-pager that really crackles if you can get past the problematic elements. At least the evil natives look scary instead of dumb. Not so much the star-crossed lady, though. She looks like Chrissy from Three's Company.
OMG. The horse on page 8 is magnificent!
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